A hunting crew in South Carolina had a "hold on to your butts" moment.
Cole Poplin of Renegade Bowfishing led a four-man team that captured the 844-pound alligator from Lake Moultrie in South Carolina, about 50 miles north of Charleston, late on Sept. 28. It is the second-largest alligator ever caught in the state, according to the Charleston Post and Courier.
Poplin told the Post and Courier that he had been hunting "Snaggletooth" for about four years. He told NewsNation that he had seen the alligator "six or seven times."
"They’re hard to come by, hard to find even if you know where he’s at,” Poplin told NewsNation.
He told the Post and Courier that he often saw "Snaggletooth" outside of alligator hunting season but spotted him during the season,
which runs from the second Saturday of September to the second Saturday of October.
"I’m hunting gators every single night, taking clients out every single night," Polin told the Post and Courier. "Four years later, we have a magical night, and he just happened to slip up and make a mistake, and we made it count."
USA TODAY reached out to Renegade Bowfishing for comment.
'The last of the dinosaurs'
The company said in a Facebook post that the alligator measured 14 feet when it was caught but measured 13 feet, 8 inches the following day. The company said it would still consider “Snaggletooth” 14 feet long, attributing the difference to rigor mortis and the body being iced for transport.
"That’s how he swam around the lake," the post said.
In an interview with Fox News, Poplin called the alligator "the last of the dinosaurs."
ABC affiliate WJCL noted that the measurements were not independently verified by the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources.
The only alligator larger than "Snaggletooth" captured in South Carolina was a 1,025-pound, 13-foot alligator caught by Maryellen Mara-Christian in 2010, also at Lake Moultrie, according to the Post and Courier.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Hunting team catches 844-pound 'Snaggletooth' after 4-year pursuit
